UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -- Victor W. Sparrow, professor of acoustics at Penn State, has been named director of the graduate program in acoustics in the College of Engineering. He assumed his new role July 1.
Sparrow had been serving as the interim director of the program since 2010.
"I am excited and honored to be named director of the acoustics program. The program is a distinguishing feature of Penn State and the College of Engineering, since it is the only program granting master's and Ph.D. degrees in acoustics in the U.S. The program has fantastic faculty members and students, and it offers the only acoustics distance education program in the world. I look forward to working with the Graduate School, the Applied Research Laboratory and other units across campus on a continuing basis to make the Graduate Program in Acoustics the best it can be," said Sparrow.
He noted his appreciation for the confidence that Harold and Inge Marcus Dean of Engineering Amr Elnashai has placed in the program. "With resources he is providing, we will begin a search for an additional acoustics faculty member in 2015-2016."
Elnashai commented: "Vic has provided steady and progressive leadership to the acoustics program as interim head for the past five years. Having been confirmed as the permanent head following an international search, Vic is now empowered to take the program to an even higher level of effectiveness and technical recognition."
Sparrow joined Penn State in 1990 and has supervised the theses of more than 40 master's and doctoral students.
His research focuses on all aspects of outdoor sound propagation, aircraft noise, nonlinear acoustics, computational acoustics, structural acoustics, virtual acoustics and scientific visualization.
Nominated by the Federal Aviation Administration and appointed by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), he has served as the U.S. Research Focal Point for the ICAO Committee on Aviation Environmental Protection's Noise Working Group and Supersonic Task Group since 2005.
Sparrow's awards and honors include the Acoustical Society of America's 1996 R. Bruce Lindsay Award and the 2012 PARTNER Center of Excellence Outstanding Faculty of the Year Award.
He is a fellow of the Acoustical Society of America and an associate fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics.
Sparrow received a dual degree in electrical engineering and computer science from Duke University, and his master's and doctorate degrees in electrical engineering from the University of Illinois.
The graduate program in acoustics is an interdisciplinary program celebrating its 50th Anniversary in 2015-16. For more information, view the program's video on YouTube.